Posts Tagged ‘USET
USET and Olympic Dreams
I posted the other day about my trip last Sunday to the site of the United States Equestrian Team Training Facility, Hamilton Farm, located in Gladstone, NJ. I decided I had to go back and talk about this location, because its unlike any other horse training center I have ever been to. I have been to this particular facility several times before, and its beautiful every time I go.
First a little history (taken from the USET website).
The United States Equestrian Team Foundation supports equestrian athletes, promotes international excellence, and builds for the future of equestrian sports.
The eight High Performance equestrian disciplines supported by the United States Equestrian Team Foundation are dressage, driving, endurance, eventing, para-equestrian, reining, show jumping and vaulting.
More about what the USET Foundation does can be found here. Now although they don’t specifically help the equine sport of Mounted Games, USET does allow us to use their beautiful facility for competitions. Hopefully someday Mounted Games will be added to the list of recognized Olympic Sports (steps are being taken to do so!) and will be supported by the USET Foundation.
So anyway onto the facility. I was able to sneak around one (yes one) of the main barns where some of the competition horses for our event were stabled and the site where we rode was. This particular barn is actually two floors – yes two floors – with stalls on both levels. There is then a third floor that has a glass floor you can see down into the barn from. I think the third floor is mostly used for award ceremonies/etc. They even house several trophy rooms in this particular barn.
Standing in the isle ways made me wonder if any famous horses had walked these halls – or stayed in these stalls – or rode in the ring. Many of the stalls had dedication plaques on them, but I ran out of time to look through all of them. I’m sure many were for past Olympic mounts – many of the greats.
I hope to one day see this barn filled with Mounted Games ponies – ponies that are destined to be Olympic horses. Not many ponies can say this as most of the Olympic disciplines are reserved for the bloodlines of horses, although some exceptions apply, Theodore O’Connor (Teddy) comes to mind – even though he was never really in the Olympics. The 14.1 hand pony who competed at the highest international eventing level with Olympian Karen O’Connor (although Teddy was from horse lineage). Teddy was an ambassador for ponies everywhere as he shed light on the fact that ponies weren’t just fuzzy backyard pets relegated to be children’s sidekicks and babysitters. Some are destined to be great.
I don’t doubt that someday Mounted Games will be among the list of Olympic Sports. In fact this year a petition was sent to have an exhibition of the sport in the World Equestrian Games for 2010. Although the petition was denied (I have suspicions why) the beginning is in place. My guess is that until there is one recognized organization and rulebook for mounted games than this cannot happen. Currently we have several organizations within the US (all with their own set of rules) instead of one main organization – we need to have one lead group…like the USDF (United States Dressage Federation), one governing body that sets the rules nationwide. Difference in opinions caused a split in our one organization – The United States Mounted Games Association, now we have two, Mounted Games Across America and USMGA. Not to mention that the United States Pony Clubs even has their own set of rules separate from MGAA and USMGA. Its sort of a big mess right now – so I think until thats all figured out there is no way we will be permitted in among the Olympic arenas.
But I do think that someday it will happen, hopefully I live to see it. The first modern Olympics to hold equestrian events were in 1900 in Paris, France. Only three disciplines were contested: Show jumping, high jump, and long jump. Several horse sports have made their appearance in the Olympics since those beginnings. You can see a small photographic history of Equestrian Olympics here. So there is hope!
